During a cardiac valve repair or replacement procedure, access to the interior of the heart may be necessary. To access the interior of the heart, physicians often conduct a median sternotomy. In a median sternotomy, the physician makes an incision along the center of the chest to divide the patient's sternum, thereby creating an access to the heart. Sternotomies result in long recovery times and involve a high risk of complications (e.g., infections) due to the lengthy surgery required for these unstable patients.
Rather than performing the more invasive median sternotomy, a less invasive thoracotomy introducer device may be used to access the interior of the heart and to provide a conduit through which other devices may be passed during the procedure. Such miniaturized introducer aids the physician in inserting the necessary repair or replacement materials into the heart while also limiting the level of physical invasiveness and the amount of blood loss. Some less invasive introducers have been developed over the years. Improvements to these introducers are nonetheless still possible and desirable.